House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, traveled to Manhattan Monday to hold a hearing focused on violent crime in an apparent retaliatory move after Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg charged former President Donald Trump over his role in a 2016 hush-money scheme.
The hearing, dubbed a "political stunt" by Bragg's office, was meant to tackle Bragg's alleged inability to prosecute crime in New York.
"Don't be fooled, this is not a serious exercise, this is a political stunt," Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-NY, said as the hearing was about to begin. "Jim Jordan and his Republican accomplices are acting as an extension of the Trump defense team trying to intimidate a duly elected district attorney of Manhattan."
Jordan and his Republican allies faulted Bragg for what they described as high violent crime rates and his focus on the former president.
"Here in Manhattan, the scales of justice are weighed down by politics," Jordan asserted in his opening statement. "Rather than enforcing the law, the DA is using his office to do the bidding of left-wing campaign funders."
Yet, as acknowledged in a statement from Bragg's office ahead of Jordan's hearing, crime in Manhattan is in steady decline since last year: murders are down 14%, shootings are down 17%, burglaries are down 21% and robberies are down 8%.
— Alvin Bragg (@ManhattanDA) April 17, 2023
"In D.A. Bragg's first year in office, New York City had one of the lowest murder rates of major cities in the United States – nearly three times lower than Columbus, Ohio," Bragg's office said in a statement. "If Chairman Jordan truly cared about public safety, he could take a short drive to Columbus, Dayton, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Akron, or Toledo in his home state, instead of using taxpayer dollars to travel hundreds of miles out of his way."
Democratic legislators echoed that sentiment during Monday's hearing.
"In light of the testimony we just heard, what is the mechanism for the committee to transfer this hearing to Ohio, where the crime rate is significantly greater?" Rep. David Cicilline, D-R.I., asked Jordan.
Per an analysis published Monday by The New York Daily News, Ohio's homicide rate (8.7 deaths for every 100,000 residents) is 73% higher than Manhattan's (5.0 deaths per 100,000 residents.)
"I'm asking how do we move the venue so we can have a hearing in a city or state that has a serious crime problem? The state of Ohio?" Cicilline pressed, with Jordan ultimately saying that his time had expired and that the ruling could not be appealed.
Protests could be heard from a somewhat small but impassioned crowd that had congregated outside the courtroom.
A bit of chaos outside the Manhattan hearing room where Jim Jordan is attempting to describe the allegedly high-crime chaos of Manhattan. pic.twitter.com/x3not765rL
— Laura Italiano (@Italiano_Laura) April 17, 2023
Though Jordan never directly addressed the obvious connection between the hearing and Trump's recent charges, Nadler made it a point to mention the former Trump repeatedly.
Accusing Jordan of "playing tourist in New York" while "doing nothing, nothing, to stop the gun violence that terrorizes our nation," Nadler argued that the hearing was directly linked to Trump.
"Let me be very clear," he said. "We are here in lower Manhattan for one reason, and one reason only. The chairman is doing the bidding of Donald Trump."
